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(Continued from reverse side) Las Vegas by the city’s retail stores. However it is reported that market analysts believe that because of certain tax-reporting difficulties last spring, returns for the first three months of 1935 sales may not include total trans­actions and that the full 1955 re­tail sales picture will be substan­tially higher than indicated. S C H O O L ENROLLMENT — There are now 24 elementary> schools and three high schools in I the Las Vegas school system, and these carried an enrollment of 14.- 188 by December, 1955. an increase of 19.5 over 1954. Local school en­rollment has grown 127 per cent from 1951 - 55. TELEPHONES IN S E R V IC E - A preliminary, unofficial estimate provided by the Southern Nevada Telephone Company showed 25.000 telephones in service in their sys­tem by Dec. 30, 1955. This is an increase of 14.5 per cent over 1954; and a gain of 56.5 per cent for the period of 1951 - 55. Offi­cials added they anticipate installa­tion of several thousand more telephones within the first f e w months of 1956 to fill pending or- [ ders, and new applications. TRUST DEED RECORDINGS — Despite the fact that 1955 trust deed recordings had to be com­pared against the remarkably peak year of 1954 — a year which saw the recording of deeds for five major resort hotels and-or hotel j additions — 1955 trust deed record-: ings totalled $61,978,021.18, a fig - 1 ure only $7,493,985.60 less than in ' 1954 — and a total almost twice as large as the $35,242,571.41 r e - . corded in 1953. Trust deed re- i cordings here have increased an amazing 549 per cent for the five- j year period of 1951 - 55- WATER SALES AND CON­SUMPTION — During 1955, water sales in the area served by the Las Vegas Valley Water District totalled $1,312 950 for an estimat­ed consumption of 5,725,000,000 gal­lons. This is an increase of 11.77 per cent in customer accounts over 1954 and a growth of 10.9 per cent in water sales over the preceding year. Between 1950 • 55. water sales increased 91.8 per cent. IN ADDITION to the bright pic­ture painted by the foregoing sta­tistics covering the year just end­ed, equally as encouraging predic­tions for 1956 were reported to have been forthcoming from busi­ness heads and officials through­out this area. Both Southern Ne­vada Power Co. and Nevada South­ern Gas Co. were revealed to be planning local expansion projects which will cost into the millions of dollars; and this week the Air Force in Washington, D. C., an­nounced approval of a $3,000,000 building program at Nellis A i r Force Base, including construction of 395 family housing units. Hotel Sahara reported it will start work on a $3,500,000 construction and remodeling program to increase the hotel’s capacity to 750 rooms. Meanwhile, plans also are going forward for development of an $8,000,000 shopping district on a 50-acre site at the intersection of E. Charleston Blvd., E. Fremont, and Boulder Highway. All in all the future for Las Vegas looks bright. Very, bright indeed. And this comes not mere­ly as a hopeful prognostication, Campbell said. There are good solid, authenti cated statistics to prove it.